Type-III Awakening Incident
* |side2 = *Rogue Type-IIIs|commanders1 = *Ronald Reagan (USA) *Mikhail Gorbachev (USSR) *Li Xiannian (PRC) *Margaret Thatcher (UK) *Numerous other world leaders |commanders2 = Unknown|casualties1 = Heavy *Hundreds of thousands of people worldwide injured or killed *Massive damage to infrastructure and cities, few cities outright destroyed *Economic and financial struggle for many states in the aftermath|casualties2 = Moderate, few hundred parahumans dead *Ice Queen †|date = 1985-1991|conc = *Cold War (end stages of)|image = Citydestroyeddcuniverse.jpg|previous = Vietnam War|next = 2003 CLAW broadcast hijacking|aka = *Parahuman Uprising *Metahuman Uprising (United States)|subevents = *Battle of Detroit *1988 New York Ice Queen Incident|threatlevel = Multiple, varied}} The Type-III Awakening Incident, the''' Awakening Incident', and also known as the' Parahuman Uprising or '''Metahuman Uprising, was a massive event in the mid-1980s which resulted in the appearance of barely understood and highly varied abilities, heralding an era of uncertainty due to hundreds of powered individuals appearing that were able to bend the laws of reality, dubbed reality warpers and more recently, metahumans and parahumans. Though most parahumans were peaceful, too many quickly turned to violence and used their newfound powers to wreak havoc globally, catching governments by surprise. These few were enough to cause damage on a titanic scale. Militaries were mobilized to contain and neutralize the threats, but were spread too thin and were less than effective against these gifted beings. The eruption of Type-III beings happened throughout the world on a massive scale; most major cities experienced some type of parahuman incident, whether by malicious intent or catastrophic accident. Background Before the rise of Type-III beings, the only known humans with supernatural capabilities were wizards, otherwise known as 'Type-II" to distinguish them from non-powered individuals on the supernatural classification scale. The first manifestation of a Type-III Human was recorded in 1983, two years before the mass-awakening incident. Despite being a scientific and magical curiosity, at the time this individual, known as Paradigm, was regarded as a mere anomaly and not a herald foreshadowing the shape of things to come. History A New World Historians place the start of the uprising during the year 1985. Parahuman activations were at first limited, the first few incidents of powers manifesting and causing disruption enough to make national headlines and spark panic and controversy, but they did not get much more severe until the end of the year. By 1986, parahuman activations were occurring daily and it worsened from there, these often violent activations causing trauma that would trigger further activations from parahumans who had not been awoken yet nearby. This led to a snowball effect, and the rate of activations and incidents increased exponentially to the point where governments and emergency relief organizations could no longer respond fast enough. With great power, came zero responsibility attempts to retake a city choked in sulfur and smog. ]]To the horror of the general populace, an increasing number of parahumans realized after awakening that they would have near total capacity and power to commit crimes, and law enforcement would be helpless to stop them. Parahuman activations now carried the risk of their victims being not helpless, frightened and panicked, but now in control, deliberate, and with the intent to inflict misery and to abuse their powers. The Battle of Detroit saw the Motor City completely obliterated when parahuman criminals transformed the region into a battleground. Due to its high population and elevated crime rates, Detroit was unfortunately one of the cities that were the most affected. A secondary awakening destroyed the city, leaving nothing but a crater behind and a dimensional fault that would force the city's inhabitants to experience their demise endlessly. In 1988, an incident occurred in New York City when a metahuman used cryogenic ice powers to freeze a substantial portion of Queens. The midwestern city known as Union Falls suffered severe damage to many of its districts, but due to its small size at the time the few hostile parahumans that had awoken within Teton County were quickly dispatched with the aid of the city's large population of wizards, and parahumans that did not wish to use their powers for destruction or revenge and instead assisted in the fight against the individuals that were. Union Falls, relatively intact, quickly became a sanctuary city where refugees from other afflicted regions would migrate to to escape the Awakening. in San Francisco.]] In San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge, Horsehoe Bay and numerous buildings along the waterfronts of the pennisula were destroyed due to structural damage or flooding caused by parahuman activity. Worldwide Devastation Awakenings throughout the world saw nearly all major cities suffer from damages caused by parahuman rampages. These events put an abrupt halt to the Cold War, as the United States and Soviet Union were forced to turn their own military forces to their own soil and even cooperate with each other to neutralize the burgeoning threat. The Middle East and Africa were most heavily affected, with many of the countries on the continent completely collapsing due to the rise of parahumans. Powered warlords rose to take control of the few remaining cities and resources left, and soon began to overrun the remaining strongholds of civilization. Most developing nations were ill-equipped to mount an adequate defense, and soon succumbed. Shortly after the Human awakenings, Anthro-feralis populations began experiencing similar manifestations, albeit at a much lower rate and percentage, suggesting that their limited Human DNA within their biology was contributing to these manifestations, but was not enough to result in the numbers that the Human populations had seen. There was fear that manifestations could have potentially occurred in Elf and Dwarf populations, but neither of these humanoid groups produced any Type-IIIs. Responses * Conventional response: Efforts by nations worldwide were somewhat effective in curbing the rampages, but all suffered heavy losses of both materiel and personnel. The economic consequences also resulting from the fallout meant that replenishment of equipment was limited at best, as stock markets across the globe plummeted in value, many companies became bankrupt, and manufacturing facilities and industrial sectors took a massive blow. As a whole, military response was stretched too thin and too overworked. * The United Nations: United Nations response was limited. Its peacekeeping forces were no match for parahumans and very few of its member states were even capable of supplying military assets to the UN, as they were occupied with mobilizing as many of their armed forces in their own borders to try and contain the threats they were facing domestically. Despite this the UN Peacekeepers were instrumental in providing disaster relief and some form of organization and security in the aftermath of attacks to cities that had survived the disasters or managed to bring down their parahumans. The UN Security Council and General Assembly oversaw much of the international joint effort against the parahumans, and many nations coordinated and cooperated with each other, sharing data and developing strategies in order to survive the Awakening. * Wizards: Many in the wizarding world, angered by the rise of parahumans and finding the idea of bending reality without magic and parahuman abuse of supernatural abilities to be barbaric, immediately mobilized in the fight against them. In the United States in particular American wizards quickly rallied under the banner of the Liberators to join the counterattack. * Knights Illuminor: The Knights Illuminor, an independent international organization for the study and practice of magic, quickly joined the fight, adding their numbers of highly trained and formidable mages to the ranks of the resistance movement. * The Resistance: This lack of a national response led many unofficial militia groups such as the Liberators, the most famous of which was formed in the United States, to take matters into their own hands. These resistance chapters were composed of ordinary citizens, former military personnel, law enforcement and emergency service workers, and private security and military forces from companies that could and were willing to supply them. By the late 1980s, these resistance fighters became known as Liberators for their efforts to free Americans from metahuman tyranny, and were organized into an official group that would later become the United Liberators Coalition. The Incident was considered to have mostly ended by 1991, and the same year saw the United Nations's member states create and ratify the 1991 Type-III Regulatory Treaty. Aftermath Directly following the Incident, the number of Type-IIIs increased exponentially for 5 years before plateauing. As of 2029, roughly 1 in every million people is an active Type-III. These new individuals were in the aftermath formally classified as "Type-III" on the supernatural classification scale as they are wholly divorced from the semi-understood but still limited Type-II identified magical community. The wizarding world itself made pronounced efforts to distinguish themselves from parahumans, expressing great contempt for destructive reality warpers who were often unable to control their powers, awakened violently, and were able to release devastating force with little to no training. Less developed countries have still not recovered from the chaos wrought during the uprising. Much of Africa has become overrun with parahuman warlord activity, the violent results of which contribute to even more activations. However, these warlords have been left in power, as they are the closest allegory to a government present in most third world countries. In the Middle East, states such as Egypt are on the front lines against these lawless metahuman territories, and as a result, a level of cooperation between states that was otherwise unlikely has been achieved on the Arabian Penninsula in the face of a threat that looms over them all. Rise of new factions With the end of the Parahuman Uprising, new legislature was created and signed into law, the most famous of which being the 1991 Type-III Regulatory Treaty created by the United Nations in order to form a dedicated international extranormal regulatory body and police force. * [[Advanced Extranormal Containment and Investigation Force|'Advanced Extranormal Containment and Investigation Force:']]' This UN organization '''was created by the treaty to prevent possible catastrophic incidents resulting from the proliferation of reality-warping powers. Actions to protect their nations and citizens included heavy regulation, registration and cataloging of known Type-III individuals. * 'United Liberators Coalition:' The United States of America in particular refused to sign the treaty and quickly passed its own legislation to outlaw all unauthorized metahuman activity. They established their national counterpart of the AEICF, legitimizing and professionally training members of the former Liberator chapters to become federal agents. The US government implemented severe penalties for violations, and in addition created a Metahuman Index to track all known Type-IIIs within America and their activities. Reconstruction era Reconstruction Era is the term referring to, for most developed countries, the time period between 1991 to 2010 where nations around the world began to recover and rebuild what was lost in the Awakening. This Reconstruction Era is global and should not be confused with Reconstruction in the aftermath of the Civil War in the United States, though that similarly involved rebuilding infrastructure on a large scale. * ''Recovered countries that have more or less returned to their pre-Awakening GDP, standard of living, and industrialization, technology and urban density levels are considered well-off. These include the United States, Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, almost all countries of Europe, most of Australia, most of China, and Japan. * Recovering countries are states still undergoing extensive reconstruction or have suffered severely from the Awakening's effects, but are still organized and functioning nations. These countries, given enough time and some assistance, are expected to eventually recover to pre-Awakening condition. This includes Argentina, Brazil, most countries in the Arabian Pennisula, India, South Africa and most IndoChina and Southeast Asian countries, and South American countries. * Forsaken countries that have ceased to exist entirely following the Awakening. These include all Saharan African states and an unfortunately high percentage of even sub-Saharan states, as well as some parts of South America. These countries were damaged badly enough by the Awakening that governments were unable to effectively combat metahuman chaos and collapsed entirely, resulting in land of what used to be their borders descending into chaos and anarchy. In the case of some territories, they are simply abandoned by civilization, and in territories that are recoverable, negotiations are ongoing to divide non-existent countries up for ownership by their functioning neighbors. Regions such as Saharan Africa are still under metahuman terror and are considered dangerous. Legacy Globally, the beings responsible for the worldwide apocalypse are often referred to as 'parahumans', while in the United States they are known as 'metahumans'. Unsurprisingly, not all of the world's remaining and recovering nations agree on the proper course of action to address them as a continuing threat in the years beyond 1991. Global In many countries, these reality-warpers are regarded with fear and disgust by many normal people and wizards, due to an intense distrust from the events of what many deem a violent uprising that was responsible for the sudden destabilization of global affairs and society. Most cities have been rebuilt with brand new, improved infrastructure and buildings. Cities in less wealthy countries however still bear some scars of the tragic and violent events that had unfolded decades past. Memorials have been erected worldwide in remembrance of the victims that perished, and in condemnation of parahumans. There was a greater appreciation of magic, which many saw effectively counterattacking parahumans. Wizards and magic practitioners experienced a surge in popularity due to their efforts in joining together to push back the parahuman threat, for their magical abilities were sometimes the only force capable of matching the strength of parahuman powers. Many American wizards joined the ULC and organizations in the following decades due to an increased demand for magical law enforcement personnel. Due to the isolationist state of North Korea, little is known about what occurred within its borders during the Awakening, but to the surprise of many the state defied collapse and not only survived but was rumored to take advantage of the situation, leading to the first rumors of a North Korean government parahuman experimentation program. In almost all AECIF-compliant countries and the United States, metahumans are not allowed to use air or water vehicles that have a passenger capacity over 50 and must take trains and other ground transportation when traveling. United States The ''Citadel-''class Aerial Battleship was constructed partially in response to the metahuman uprising, utilizing Areum-enhanced technology with the intention to use its own supernaturally-enhanced weapons against Type-IIIs in the event they became enemies of the state or used by enemy powers. The city of Union Falls, its population drastically increased due to refugees streaming in from other cities, retained much of its new citizenry, the majority of whom decided to settle down and start their life anew due to their old homes having been destroyed. On a larger scale, numerous corporations and industry giants migrated to Union Falls for a similar reason, also seeing the potential of profit and booming business from the rapidly growing and increasingly wealthy metropolis. There is much less tolerance for terrorism and the ULC, along with other national security and emergency response agencies, have taken hard-line policies against both metahumans and situations that put larger numbers of people at risk, preferring to adopt a 'shoot first and ask questions later' policy, terminating the cause of the problem instead of attempting negotiation, a position born out of necessity during the Awakening Incident due to metahumans simply wanting to cause destruction and having no terms, and both children and adults who could not control their destructive rampages even with attempts to do so. Category:Conflicts